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Sunday, March 12, 2017

Here's my debut blog/vlog, after over a year sabbatical of not blogging! And I must admit I feel excited about publishing this video, "The Physics & Spirituality of Gift Economy." This talk is a crystallization of years of what I've learned living without money.

Thanks to my friend Cullen Purser for filming this talk.

I dare say you'll hear things in this talk you've never heard before... that I know of. Yeah, that I know of. New buds on a tree blossom all over the tree, so perhaps you will witness this same blossoming in other parts of the world. They are not from me but from the Whole.

My dad passed away over a year ago (February 19th, 2016) a month before what would be his 88th birthday on March 23rd. Then, it felt gloomily auspicious that on March 23rd, 2016, my moneyless comrade in Germany, Heidemarie Schwermer, passed away. So it's been me living with and taking care of just my mom since then. 2016 felt like one of the darkest years of my life. And I haven't been able to bring myself to blog until now.

Two years ago, after 15 years of living without money, I had to put my moneyless lifestyle on hold to be the live-in caretaker of my aging parents. One year ago, my dad passed away.

Ironically, I’ve had to manage my parents’ bank account, go shopping, and deal with the bureaucracy and culture shock of it all as well as go through the grieving process. This time has give me the opportunity to delve inward, to process ideas from the previous 15 years of living moneyless. It helps me empathize with a world trapped in commerce.

I’ve watched these ideas blossom into epiphanies. And these epiphanies are crystallizing into a coherent science, philosophy, and theology of gift economy. Gift economy (meaning economy without money or conscious barter) is already the law of this infinite universe all around us. Now I am grateful for the opportunity to share these epiphanies with the public.

You can't see most my slides in this video, so I'm including the slides separate for reference (List shows slide numbers that coincide with video times):

Jesus driving moneychangers & merchants from the Temple.

Sadhu of India

Call me Suelo

I lived totally without cents since Autumn of 2000 (except for a couple months in 2001) until the Spring of 2016, when I started caring for my aging parents, managing their finances. For 15 years I didn't use or accept money or conscious barter - nor did I take food stamps or other government dole. My philosophy has been to use only what is freely given or discarded and what is already present and already running (whether or not I existed).
I don't see money as evil or good: how can illusion be evil or good? But I don't see heroin or meth as evil or good, either. Which is more addictive and debilitating, money or meth?
Attachment to illusion makes you illusion, makes you not real. Attachment to illusion is called idolatry, called addiction. I simply got tired of acknowledging as real this most common world-wide belief called money! I simply got tired of being unreal. Money is one of those intriguing things that seems real and functional because 2 or more people believe it is real & functional!